Ties That Bind
by ReganX
Summary: Even from an evil act, something beautiful can come. Faith kidfic.
1. Prologue

**Disclaimer:** Since my name is not Joss Whedon, 'Buffy: The Vampire Slayer', 'Angel' and the characters associated with the show belong to someone who in't me. I also do not own the storyline, that is taken from gidgetgirl's 'The Lost Child Challenge' (details below) posted at the Chocolate Covered Strawberries Archive.

**The Lost Child Challenge**

When Faith was fourteen, she was raped by her mother's boyfriend. After that, she left home on her own, pregnant with the rapist's child. When she was found by the Council, her first Watcher took the baby, assuring Faith that it would be taken care of... the Watcher then was killed by Kakistos before she could give Faith more information. Now, years later, the child has come back into Faith's life.

**Requirements:**

**- **Faith dealing with mixed feelings about the child: a mother's love and the memory of the rape.  
- The child having a Faith-esque attitude problem  
- The council having had some hand in the child's conception  
- The child having an amazing destiny  
- Faith wanting to save her daughter from her own mistakes

**Author's Note I: **The events of the prologue take place at the same time as those of the end of the Buffy Season Two episode 'Becoming, Part I'.

**Author's Note II: **Anyone have any idea what genre I should put this under?

* * *

**Prologue**

_**Boston, May 19th 1998**_

She had never imagined anything could hurt this much.

It was like something - a very large, very heavy something - was trying to claw it's way out of her.

She felt as though she had been going through this pain for months, years, although the clock on the wall told her that it had been fifteen hours so far.

Fifteen hours, on her fifteenth birthday.

It was almost ironic.

"Good girl, Faith. You're doing really well." The woman on her bed, though in reality not much more than a decade her senior, held her hand and stroked her hair, as her mother would have.

No, not as her mother would have.

Her mother had kicked her out, she didn't want anything to do with her, didn't want to believe what she had heard, what Bryan had done.

She had hated having that bastard's kid squirming inside her.

She had wanted to have an abortion, she had been ready to and she would have had one before Constance came along.

She didn't believe in guardian angels, not any more, not after what had happened, but if she did, she would have thought that the woman who had found her the night her mother had pushed her away, screaming that she was lying, the woman who had looked after her when nobody else cared whether she lived or died, was one.

"It won't be long now." Constance murmured soothingly, holding the young girl gently, trying to steel her heart, to will herself not to care.

She had a job to do.

At her nod, a nurse in a starched white uniform approached, needle in hand.

"Nurse Richards is going to give you a shot now, Faith, it will take the pain away, I promise." She whispered, trying not to think about how young and vulnerable the girl in her arms looked.

Wanting nothing but an end to the spasms of agony she was suffering, the dark-haired teenager gratefully allowed the nurse to inject her with the anesthetic, her body becoming limp, her eyes sleepy and unfocused, scarcely aware of what was happening as the nurse was joined by a doctor and the two of them worked to bring her unwanted burden into the world.

As if in a dream, she heard a baby's cry.

* * *

The child in her arms whimpered softly as Constance Havering slipped out of the delivery room and marched through the hallway to the man awaiting her.

The nurse and the doctor, their silence bought with generous bribes, finished up their work on the unconscious girl, a girl who had trusted Constance with her life.

She resolutely pushed these thoughts from her mind.

She had known from the beginning what must be done, she had known that she shouldn't get attached, shouldn't allow herself to feel guilty about what the girl who had become almost a surrogate daughter to her had endured.

It was vital that this child be born, be raised on the side of Good.

Compared with what this baby would someday be able to do, the suffering of one girl was unimportant.

At least that's what she tried to make herself believe.

For a brief moment she considered running, taking Faith and the baby away, confessing everything, but she couldn't. The influence of her training was too strong.

Quentin Travers held out his arms as she approached, taking the newborn infant and studying her carefully, as a jeweller might apraise a diamond, inspecting her for any flaws.

"Well?" His voice was curt.

"It's a little girl."

"We expected as much." He scrutinized the child. "Is she healthy?"

"Perfectly."

"I'll make the necessary arrangements to bring her back to England. I leave the mother in your hands."

"Yes sir." She hated herself for her submission to what she knew in her heart was wrong, hated her superior for being able to view the situation so coldly, for being able to walk away from the suffering his plan had caused an innocent girl.

_/It had to be done. It's for the best. /_

No matter how many times she told herself that, she couldn't quite bring herself to believe it.

* * *

Her head ached and her vision was blurry as she came to and saw Constance looking down on her, a sorrowful expression in her grey eyes.

"What's wrong?" Her voice was groggy. "What was it? A boy or a girl?"

"A girl." Constance wiped her eyes with a tissue. "Stillborn, the poor little thing, not meant for this world."

Faith was silent for a long time, reflecting on the events of the past nine - or, more accurately, eight and a half - months.

When she had found out that she was pregnant, all she had wanted was to get rid of it. She didn't want a reminder of Bryan, of everything he had done, calling her 'Mom'.

It had been Constance who had persuaded her that, despite the circumstances of its conception, the child was innocent, that it was hers.

Now she would never know whether she could have learned to love the baby, her baby.

"Maybe its better this way." She said at last, her voice hollow, wanting, _needing_ to believe what she was saying. "Maybe it's for the best."

TBC.

_Author's Note: Should I bother to continue with this story? Please review and let me know if there are any requests._


	2. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer:** Since my name is not Joss Whedon, 'Buffy: The Vampire Slayer', 'Angel' and the characters associated with the show belong to someone who in't me. I also do not own the storyline, that is taken from gidgetgirl's 'The Lost Child Challenge' (details below) posted at the Chocolate Covered Strawberries Archive.

**The Lost Child Challenge**

When Faith was fourteen, she was raped by her mother's boyfriend. After that, she left home on her own, pregnant with the rapist's child. When she was found by the Council, her first Watcher took the baby, assuring Faith that it would be taken care of... the Watcher then was killed by Kakistos before she could give Faith more information. Now, years later, the child has come back into Faith's life.

**Requirements:**

- Faith dealing with mixed feelings about the child: a mother's love and the memory of the rape.  
- The child having a Faith-esque attitude problem  
- The council having had some hand in the child's conception  
- The child having an amazing destiny  
- Faith wanting to save her daughter from her own mistakes

**Author's Note I: **This chapter takes place after the Season Seven Finale of Buffy, about five years after the prologue.

**Author's Note II: **To Freezyboncoolipants – Since Buffy was called at fifteen, I figure Kendra and Faith were too. Since Slayers don't live very long, replacing a Slayer with someone older wouldn't make sense. Plus I wanted to factor in that she was fourteen when the baby was conceived.

**Author's Note III: **To gidgetgirl – Sadly, I think most of the Council, including Travers, are already dead so he won't be getting the ass-kissing he so richly deserves, although a big thank you to Imzadi for reminding me about Roger Wyndham-Pryce still being among the living – I'd forgotten about him.

**Author's Note IV: **To Faeries Twilight and C'est Magnifique – Thanks for your advice on genre. Angst/Drama sounds about right.

* * *

**C****hapter 1**

_**Kent, England.**_

The immaculately kept lawn in the garden of the large, walled estate had just been mown and the scent of the freshly cut grass tickled her nose as she carefully took aim, leveling her crossbow, a gift from her adoring guardian, at the target and firing.

"Bullseye." Her trainer congratulated her warmly. "Well done."

Acknowledging his praise with a curt nod, the little girl, slightly built even for her five years, impatiently brushed away a dark curl that had escaped from it's ribbon, narrowing her eyes at the painted circle in front of her, preparing for a second shot.

Mr Faulkner had started teaching her how to use a crossbow just a few weeks before the bad news about her guardian had arrived and, although he said that she was a natural, she couldn't muster the same enthusiasm she had had when she had known that Uncle Quentin was going to hear about how she was getting on, that he was going to come to visit to see her, that he was going to be proud of her.

The people who took care of her, her tutors, her trainers, even her nannies never stayed very long, sometimes only for a couple of months.

Even the people who worked in the house, who did all the cleaning and cooking, were always leaving.

Everybody always left her.

Everybody except Uncle Quentin and now, he too had been taken from her.

She felt tears pricking her eyes and blinked fiercely to suppress them.

Only the weak cried.

She was special, Uncle Quentin had always told her that.

She was going to be a great warrior and she was going to help a lot of people, maybe even save the world if she worked hard and did everything she was supposed to.

When she was grown up, she was going to be a very important person.

She liked to think that when that day came, when she was a great warrior and a hero, her not-a-mother would somehow, magically know about it.

Then she would be sorry that she hadn't wanted her, that she'd abandoned her.

And Uncle Quentin would see, even from up in Heaven, and he would be happy with her.

_**

* * *

**_

_**London.**_

_**Headquarters of the Inner Sanctum of the Watcher's Council.**_

" 'Slayer is willful and insolent. Her abuse of the English language is such that I understand only every other sentence.' – Giles, I'm hurt!" Buffy looked up at him with an expression of mock pique. "Is that what you really think of me?"

Giles looked away sheepishly, taking off his glasses and cleaning them as he tried to think of an appropriate response but Buffy, immersed in the file she had – amid the very vocal protests of the two gentlemen entrusted with the task of file-keeping, who had not yet given up their complaints that only those with the highest security clearance were permitted to access their files – liberated from the Record Room, had already forgotten about him.

"I guess the 'S' stands for Slayer." Willow observed, tracing the old-fashioned wax seal on the cover of Buffy's file with her finger.

"It can't be that." Kennedy observed practically. "Mine has one too and those two" She nodded in the direction of their very unhappy audience. "Didn't know about your spell until we told them."

"Mine has a 'H' on it." Faith narrowed her eyes suspiciously, glaring at the hapless clerks. "What's that supposed to be for?"

"Hot head?"

Dawn, who had made the suggestion, ended up on the receiving end of a death-glare.

Faith grunted as she lifted the file. "This thing's heavy." She opened it to reveal a large, fold out sheet of yellowing paper detailing a web of names, mostly women's, some of them highlighted. "You Watcher types really go into detail, don't you?" Her tone was grudgingly admiring. "This thing must go back at least five hundred years, maybe more."

"Good Lord." Giles looked impressed as he leaned forward to inspect the carefully mapped out family tree. "I didn't know you were related to Rachel Knight."

"Neither did I." Faith responded with perfect truth.

Her mother had never been one for sentimental reminiscing and family history.

"And Rachel Knight would be . . .?" Xander prompted.

"A Slayer in America during the early nineteenth century, quite a celebrated one. Some of her exploits are legendary."

"I don't have one." Buffy complained. "Was the Summers family not worth researching?"

"Mine wasn't either, if that's any consolation." Kennedy offered.

"Maybe Faith's Slayer royalty?"

Faith grinned at Dawn's suggestion. "I can live with that."

Xander, intrigued, traced the line with his finger, noting with some amusement and slight indignation that men seemed to have been beneath the notice of whoever had complied the family tree, which included several names he vaguely recalled from the seven years worth of research he had done as a member of the Scooby Gang.

His handsome face became serious as he found Faith's name, a narrow line leading from it to another.

His brow was furrowed, his expression puzzled as he looked up at the dark-haired Slayer.

"Who's Eleanor?"

TBC.


	3. Chapter 2

**Disclaimer:** Since my name is not Joss Whedon, 'Buffy: The Vampire Slayer', 'Angel' and the characters associated with the show belong to someone who in't me. I also do not own the storyline, that is taken from gidgetgirl's 'The Lost Child Challenge' (details below) posted at the Chocolate Covered Strawberries Archive.

**The Lost Child Challenge**

When Faith was fourteen, she was raped by her mother's boyfriend. After that, she left home on her own, pregnant with the rapist's child. When she was found by the Council, her first Watcher took the baby, assuring Faith that it would be taken care of... the Watcher then was killed by Kakistos before she could give Faith more information. Now, years later, the child has come back into Faith's life.

**Requirements:**

Faith dealing with mixed feelings about the child: a mother's love and the memory of the rape.  
- The child having a Faith-esque attitude problem  
- The council having had some hand in the child's conception  
- The child having an amazing destiny  
- Faith wanting to save her daughter from her own mistakes

**Author's Note I: **To Imzadi and C'est Magnifique - I won't answer the 'S' and 'H' question now, but if you compare the files of the two 'S's - Buffy and Kennedy - with the 'H' - Faith - you might figure it out.

**Author's Note II: **To C'est Magnifique - Eleanor was born in Boston on May 19th 1998.

**Author's Note III: **To chattypandagurl - Next chapter.

* * *

**Chapter 2**

Roger Wyndham-Pryce gasped like a landed fish as Faith wrapped her hands around his neck, intent on choking the life out of him.

He looked across at the others, silently willing them to rescue him, but for some reason they seemed remarkably unwilling to come to his aid.

It wasn't until his face had turned a rather alarming shade of blue that the angry Slayer loosened her grasp enough to allow him to draw a shallow, choking breath.

"Where is she?" She ground out the question through gritted teeth. "What did you do with my daughter?"

"I don't know who you're talking about."

"Giles?" Faith's voice was coldly conversational. "Exactly how mad would the Council be if I tortured this bastard?"

"There is no Council to speak of." He told her, knowing that she knew this.

"Even better." Her eyes glinted dangerously.

Roger was deeply regretting that he, hearing that the three Slayers, their Watcher and friends had invaded the Council's inner sanctum, had made his way to the record room to indignantly demand that they cease their activities.

"So what'll it be?" She gave him a mock-cheerful smile. "There are five basic torture groups; blunt, shart, hot, cold and loud. I'm thinking of adding a new one - electric. Any preference? Or do you feel like talking to me?"

Too intimidated to do anything else, he nodded hastily. "I'll tell you everything I know."

_

* * *

_

_**May 20th, 1998.**_

_"Don't look. It will be easier for you if you don't see her." Constance's voice had been gentle as she held her, soothing her as though she were a child._

_She had warned her that, if she saw the face of the baby girl, it would haunt her._

_The tiny white coffin had been buried, sealed, in the small cemetery near the hospital._

_The grave was marked with a small statue of an angel bearing the date of birth, but no name._

_Faith had determinedly suppressed her tears, reminding herself sternly that she would not have been able to take care of a baby, that it was better this way._

_Try as she might to ignore the thought, she was haunted by the idea that she had done something wrong, that the late nights she had spent in clubs, the alcohol she had drunk, had killed her baby._

_She had hated Bryan, had hated that hisspawn was squirming inside her._

_Had her hatred poisoned her baby?_

_"It's not your fault." Constance had reassured her, as if she had read her thoughts. "There was nothing you could have done."_

_Though she normally shyed away from physical contact, she had allowed the Watcher to hug her, grateful for the comfort, glad that she still had her._

_Within three months, Constance had been killed._

* * *

"She lied to me." Faith's voice was hoarse. "I trusted her."

None of them knew what they should say.

Roger Wyndham-Pryce, understandably eager to cooperate, had hastened to find out everything he could about the little girl, though he had said that most of the information about her was classified and that not even he had had access to it until very recently.

"She's five now." Faith mused aloud

She had missed out on five years.

She hated herself for having agreed that it would have been better for her to allow her 'stillborn' daughter to be buried without looking at her.

If she had only insisted on seeing her baby . . .

She had never spoken of her baby after the funeral.

She and Constance had studiously avoided the subject and even the Mayor, who had been as close to a father as she had ever known, had never been told.

Faith hadn't had the displeasure of meeting Quentin Travers but, if what she had heard from Buffy, Giles and the others was any indication, he had been far from pleasant.

She shuddered inwardly.

If he had hurt her daughter in any way she was going to have Willow resurrect him just so that she could have the satisfaction of killing him herself.

Slowly.

A reluctant cough at the doorway announced Roger's presence.

His hand trembled ever so slightly as he held out a large envelope.

"This is the address." He said, understandably nervous about facing the seething Slayer. "And a photograph. That's all I can get without proper access. . ."

Faith eagerly tore the envelope from his hand, cutting him off. She ripped the envelope open, sending a slip of paper and a photograph flying.

Giles picked up the slip of paper, studying the address on it. "This estate is in Kent. I know of it."

Faith barely heard him.

The photograph was of an average size and for the briefest of instants, she had been afraid to look at it, afraid that her daughter would look like Bryan.

She didn't know whether she could handle that.

She stared at the image for several minutes without saying a word.

"Faith?" Buffy's tone was gentle. "Are you okay?"

The younger woman nodded, biting her lip. "She's beautiful."

TBC.

_Author's Note: That's all for now. Don't forget to review. Next chapter - Faith meets Eleanor._


	4. Chapter 3

**Disclaimer:** Since my name is not Joss Whedon, 'Buffy: The Vampire Slayer', 'Angel' and the characters associated with the show belong to someone who isn't me. I also do not own the storyline, that is taken from gidgetgirl's 'The Lost Child Challenge' (details below) posted at the Chocolate Covered Strawberries Archive.

**The Lost Child Challenge**

When Faith was fourteen, she was raped by her mother's boyfriend. After that, she left home on her own, pregnant with the rapist's child. When she was found by the Council, her first Watcher took the baby, assuring Faith that it would be taken care of... the Watcher then was killed by Kakistos before she could give Faith more information. Now, years later, the child has come back into Faith's life.

**Requirements:**

Faith dealing with mixed feelings about the child: a mother's love and the memory of the rape.  
- The child having a Faith-esque attitude problem  
- The council having had some hand in the child's conception  
- The child having an amazing destiny  
- Faith wanting to save her daughter from her own mistakes

**Author's Note I: **To Imzadi - Don't worry, I'm not finished with Roger Wyndham-Pryce. He's one of the few characters I hated before he'd ever made an appearance.

**Author's Note II: **To 'too tired to sign on' and vanillagigglez - S and H do not stand for Slayer and Host or, much as I'd love to see the expressions on Buffy and Faith's faces, for Stupid and Hothead. The key to the H, at least, is in Faith's file.

* * *

**Chapter 3**

**_Kent, England._**

**_The next day._**

"I don't want to see her." The little girl's jaw was set and her fierce expression would have been almost comical on the face of so young a child if not for the cold anger in her blue eyes.

"I know you don't, dear." The middle aged woman charged with her physical well-being spoke soothingly, wanting to calm her charge. "But, after all, she is your moth. . ."

"No." She raised an imperious hand. "She's not. I don't have a mother. She's my not-a-mother. She didn't want me, so I don't want her."

Knowing better than to argue with her, the nanny concentrated on combing the little girl's dark brown curls into sleek ringlets and tying her blue ribbon.

The little girl was her pride and joy, as adored as her own child and she dreaded the day when she would be transferred to another post.

"There." She beamed. "You look lovely."

"I don't care." The five year old's expression was mutinous.

Her nanny sighed.

Despite her tender years, Eleanor could be as stubborn as a mule when she so chose.

She couldn't help but pity the young woman who was to make the aquaintance of her daughter that afternoon.

* * *

"This place is amazing!" Xander's expression was awed as he took in their surroundings. "All of this is for one kid?"

The house Giles had driven them to was bigger than Angel's mansion had been and older, set a amid large gardens and sprawling grounds that were obviously carefully tended.

Buffy couldn't help but shiver slightly.

Houses like this were all very well in period movies, but it seemed a cold, imposing place to grow up.

"This estate has been the property of the Travers family for generations." Giles told them, pulling his car to a stop in front of the stone steps leading into the house. "I didn't think that it was still in use."

Faith took a deep breath before climbing out of the car, more frightened than she cared to admit about the prospect of meeting her daughter, the child she had mourned for five years.

She couldn't allow herself to dwell on how her daughter's babyhood and early years had been stolen from her by the person she had trusted, if she did, she'd end up hurting someone and that would hardly be the best way to begin her relationship with her child.

"Mr Giles?" A tall man dressed in a black suit, who looked so proper that he could only be a butler, greeted them coolly when he answered the door.

"Yes." Giles nodded curtly. "These are. . ."

"Follow me, please." He cut him off imperiously and led them through the large hall into a reception room, decorated in cold shades of blue and furnished with what were obviously antiques. "Miss Knight will be down shortly." He inclined his head slightly and left the room.

Faith frowned.

She couldn't think why they were using her great-great-great grandmother's surname instead of hers, but she was relieved that they weren't using Bryan's.

"Do you want us to stay with you?" Buffy asked gently, laying a hand on the younger woman's arm.

Faith managed a smile and shook her head. "No thanks."

"Mind if we check it out outside?" Xander seemed eager to get out of the house as soon as possible.

She sympathised wholeheartedly.

"Go ahead."

"Are you sure." Giles pressed, clearly concerned.

"Go on." She shooed them away with a slight wave of her hand.

This was one challenge she would have to face alone.

* * *

She had been sitting alone in the reception room, watched over by the portraits of people she assumed were ancestors of Travers, for what seemed like hours, although in reality no more than five minutes had passed, when the door was opened for a second time and a uniformed nanny made her entrance, leading a small girl by the hand.

"Hi." Faith did her best to hide her apprehension as she greeted her daughter. She wanted to hug her, to sweep her up in her arms and shower her with kisses, but she could guess that such a demonstration on her part would not be welcomed. She settled for holding out her hand.

"How do you do?" The little girl's voice was polite. She left her small hand in Faith's for scarcely a second before pulling it away, gesturing towards the chairs. "Would you care to have a seat?"

"Thanks." Confronted with the astonishingly poised child, poor Faith was at a loss for words.

"How do you do?" The nanny accompanying Eleanor shook her hand with far more warmth than her charge had. "I'm Mrs Perkins. It's a pleasure to meet you." She smiled down at the little girl at her side. "She's the spit of you."

Although Mrs Perkins was well aware of the fact that Eleanor would have liked to argue that point, to insist that she was nothing like the woman she had dubbed her 'not-a-mother', the resemblence between the two of them was unmistakeable.

Aside from her eyes, which were a light blue, the little girl was a miniature of her mother in colouring and features, with the smae slight build.

"Well, I'll leave you two to get acquainted. Would you like me to get you something to drink? Some tea, maybe?" She asked encouragingly.

"Thank you, no." Eleanor answered on both their behalfs.

Mrs Perkins excused herself murmuring excuses about having to see to unspecified tasks, leaving mother and daughter alone.

Eleanor took a seat on the low couch, as far away from Faith as she possibly could, her hands primly folded in her lap, resting on the skirt of her pale blue dress.

"Hi, Eleanor." Faith smiled tentatively. "I'm Faith. Do you know who I am?"

"I do."

"I'm glad to meet you." The dainty little lady sitting opposite her made no attempt to mirror her sentiments. "Do people ever call you Ellie?"

"No, never." The response was cold.

Faith felt like she was talking to an elderly dowager rather than to a five year old child. _Her_ five year old child.

"Do you like it here? Are they nice to you?" Her query was anxious.

"Yes."

"What do you like to do?"

"I do my lessons, I train with Mr Jamison and I sometimes play with Mrs Perkins." She clearly had no intention of elaborating any further.

"I see."

Her not-a-mother was clearly uncomfortable, the little girl noted with satisfaction.

She would have liked to kick and scream, to lash out at her, to tell her that she never wanted to see her again, but she wasn't going to disappoint Uncle Quentin by forgetting the manners he had taught her, not even under the circumstances.

"I've missed you." Only a colossal effort on Faith's part kept the tears from flowing, and prevented her from snatching up the little girl and carrying her away.

"Perhaps you should have thought of that sooner." She rose. "Excuse me."

Biting her lower lip fiercely to keep the tears at bay, the five year old ran out of the room, forgetting her dignity enough to slam the door, and hurried up to her room, determined not to cry.

She could not, _would _not let that woman affect her like this.

Faith sighed quietly, her breathing sounding uncomfortably loud in the stillness of the room.

_/That could have gone better. /_

TBC.


	5. Chapter 4

**Disclaimer:** Since my name is not Joss Whedon, 'Buffy: The Vampire Slayer', 'Angel' and the characters associated with the show belong to someone who in't me. I also do not own the storyline, that is taken from gidgetgirl's 'The Lost Child Challenge' (details below) posted at the Chocolate Covered Strawberries Archive.

**The Lost Child Challenge**

When Faith was fourteen, she was raped by her mother's boyfriend. After that, she left home on her own, pregnant with the rapist's child. When she was found by the Council, her first Watcher took the baby, assuring Faith that it would be taken care of... the Watcher then was killed by Kakistos before she could give Faith more information. Now, years later, the child has come back into Faith's life.

**Requirements:**

Faith dealing with mixed feelings about the child: a mother's love and the memory of the rape.  
The child having a Faith-esque attitude problem  
The council having had some hand in the child's conception  
The child having an amazing destiny  
Faith wanting to save her daughter from her own mistakes

* * *

**Chapter 4**

_**Kent, England.**_

"How did it go?" Seeing the somber expression on Faith's face, Xander posed the question tentatively.

She shrugged wryly. "Not well."

"I suppose it might have been worse." Giles suggested, doing his best to sound cheerful and failing miserably.

"Yeah – if she'd shot me or something. She probably felt like it. I could see it in her face – she hates me."

Buffy's heart ached with sympathy for her one time foe. "I'm sure she doesn't . . ."

"She does." Faith sighed. "And I can't say that I blame her. I should have insisted on seeing her, no matter what Constance said. If I had . . ."

"It wouldn't have made the slightest difference." Giles cut her off firmly. "Do any of you have any idea of the extent of the Council's influence? They have a network of bribed officials at every level of bureaucracy, fingers in hundreds of pies, thousands of strings that they can pull – if you had tried to stop them taking Eleanor, it would have been a fairly simple matter for them to arrange to have you declared an unfit mother, or even to falsify the results of a blood test to prove that you weren't related to her." He almost added that she could have found herself arrested on a trumped up charge and spending the rest of her life rotting in a jail but decided that it would not have been the most tactful of comment's, given the dark-haired Slayer's history.

"But why?" None of them had an answer to Faith's question. "What do they want with my daughter?"

* * *

_**London.**_

The archives of the Inner Sanctum of the Watcher's Council concerned matters deemed to be too important, or too dangerous to be stored in the main record section, those for which secrecy was deemed vital.

Only a handful of people had had access to these files and documents, and more than half of that group had been killed.

A combination of arguing on Buffy's part, threats of Faith's and magick on Willow's had 'persuaded' the Council's Senior Custodian of Records, the Honourable Emerence Marsh-Hadley, that Giles should be admitted to that privileged circle.

"Perhaps I'll get a raise." Giles commented dryly, ignoring the protests of the Honourable Miss Marsh-Hadley and ushering them into the library.

It was a huge room, perhaps twice as large as the gym at Sunnydale High was, paneled in dark wood with the walls on three sides of it lined from floor to ceiling with bookshelves laden with leather bound volumes, including the Watcher's Diaries of the past several millennia and files, thicker by far than those they had read earlier, on Slayers, Potentials and Watchers throughout the ages. The fourth wall was covered with tapestries and portraits that glared down at the group that had intruded upon this sacred space.

"These all have 'S' and 'H' on them too." Kennedy grumbled. "Anyone have any idea what they stand for?"

A collective shrug was the only response she received.

"Check this out." Willow's tone was awed as she gestured towards a large tapestry that seemed to be the centerpiece for the fourth wall, covered in a sprawling web of names carefully stitched in fine gold thread. "And I thought the family tree in Faith's file was impressive!"

She craned her neck, squinting as she tried to make out the name at the top of the tapestry, the ancestor of this many millennia old family.

She was considering a spell to help her make it out when, as if the tapestry had read her mind, the name increased in size, illuminated in a faint glow.

"Cool trick." Willow furrowed her brow in confusion. What she had thought was a name was not written in any language or script she recognized. "What is that?"

"The first Slayer." Buffy responded automatically, her voice soft as she approached, tracing a name with her finger and watching as a network of names sprang from her touch, weaving their way through the deep crimson cloth, so dark that it was almost black, of the tapestry. "And this is her family."

"As fascinating as this is," Giles cut in, indicating the massive room and its contents with a wave of his hand. "We have a great deal of material to get through and, while we don't have a deadline, we ought not waste time."

"Can't the one eyed man be excused from research?" Xander asked hopefully, assuming his most pathetic facial expression as he gestured towards his eye patch.

"No."

* * *

"Eleanor's a little doll!" Willow murmured fondly as she leafed through the photographs in the folder documenting the little girl's development over the five years of her life. "She's so adorable."

"She looks just like you, Faith." Kennedy said, looking at the photograph over her girlfriend's shoulder.

"Except with blue eyes and a better grooming regimen, Buffy added playfully, receiving a light punch in the arm for her pains.

Fortunately Giles was so deeply immersed in a detailed account of the career of Rachel Knight that he failed to notice that all five of them had abandoned their own tasks in favour of examining Eleanor's file.

"Looks like she takes after her mother in more than just her looks." Xander chuckled good-naturedly. "There doesn't seem to have been a single member of her staff that's lasted more than six months – not even the gardeners or the maids. Looks like someone's a trouble maker."

"Let me see that." Willow extended a hand for the records, her frown growing progressively deeper as she studied them. "How many babies do you know who can go through four nannies by their first birthday?"

"Besides Cordelia?" Xander quipped half-heartedly.

"At intervals of exactly three months?" The red-haired witch raised a skeptical eyebrow. "Nobody on this list quit, they were all transferred to other posts."

"Why?" Faith was bewildered by this information.

"I don't know." Willow sighed. "I'm sorry, Faith, I can't tell."

"Faith?" Buffy looked across the table at the other girl, a copy of the birth certificate of Eleanor Constance Knight in one hand. "Do you know what time Eleanor was born?"

"Constance told me she was born around eleven o'clock at night." Faith responded, then her expression darkened. "But then again, she told me a lot of things."

Chewing her lower lip thoughtfully, Buffy did some quick calculating. "That's about the same time that Kendra died, and when Kendra died . . ."

"I was called." Faith finished for her. "Is that why they wanted her?" Even though she knew perfectly well that none of them would be able to answer her, she had to pose the question aloud. "Because she was born while I was called?"

"Maybe it gave her some kind of power." Buffy suggested. "I doubt there was a precedent. I don't know of any other Slayers with kids – except Nikki Wood, of course." She added as an after thought.

"She we ask Giles?" Kennedy queried, glancing across at the gentleman in question, who was happily engrossed in his reading.

"Nah, we'll ask him later." A ghost of a smile graced Faith's face. "At least somebody here's enjoying himself."

"The Council must have known in advance when Kendra was going to die – and when you were going to have your baby." Willow mused aloud. "They would have had to have somebody at the hospital to take Eleanor before you knew. . ." She trailed off.

"Before I knew that the only person I thought I could trust had lied to me and that my daughter was alive?" Faith scowled darkly. "Damnit!" She struck the first section of the file with an open hand, sending a shower of papers flying.

Crouching down to help her rescue the fallen documents, Xander offered her a slight smile. "At least we can be grateful for one thing – British organization. They're all numbered. Faith?" his smile disappeared and his expression became one of concern. "Are you okay? What's wrong?"

The dark-haired Slayer was silent, not answering, not even seeming to hear the questions. Her brown eyes, wide with horror and anger, were fixed on a piece of paper.

In her hand she held a copy of a check for fifty thousand dollars, dated the 7th of September, made out to Bryan McDermott and signed Quentin R. Travers.

TBC.

_Author's Note: That's all for now. Please review._

_Author's Note II: For those of you who have forgotten the Prologue, Bryan McDermott was Eleanor's biological father._


	6. Chapter 5

**Disclaimer:** Since my name is not Joss Whedon, 'Buffy: The Vampire Slayer', 'Angel' and the characters associated with the show belong to someone who in't me. I also do not own the storyline, that is taken from gidgetgirl's 'The Lost Child Challenge' (details below) posted at the Chocolate Covered Strawberries Archive.

**The Lost Child Challenge**

When Faith was fourteen, she was raped by her mother's boyfriend. After that, she left home on her own, pregnant with the rapist's child. When she was found by the Council, her first Watcher took the baby, assuring Faith that it would be taken care of... the Watcher then was killed by Kakistos before she could give Faith more information. Now, years later, the child has come back into Faith's life.

**Requirements:**

Faith dealing with mixed feelings about the child: a mother's love and the memory of the rape.  
The child having a Faith-esque attitude problem  
The council having had some hand in the child's conception  
The child having an amazing destiny  
Faith wanting to save her daughter from her own mistakes

* * *

**Chapter 5**

_**Kent, England.**_

_**The next day.**_

_She had been on tenterhooks all day, waiting for his arrival, so excited that she could barely concentrate on her training exercises, so determined to make a good impression that she had not even objected to the length of time that Mrs White had spent fussing over her hair and dress._

_Even though he wasn't as tall as some of the people she knew, he seemed like a giant to her, a demigod._

"_Uncle Quentin!" His car had barely stopped when she, abandoning all dignity, had dashed down the steps, running towards him._

_Chuckling warmly, he scooped her up. "How's my little Ella?"_

"_Fine. I've been waiting for you all day."_

_He smiled at her. "I'm glad to hear it. And can Uncle Quentin get a kiss from his favourite girl?"_

_Putting her little arms around his neck, the not quite four year old pressed her lips against his cheek, hugging him tightly, grateful that she had him, that she would always have him._

_Her nanny, Mrs Adams had left the week before, and her trainer a month before that._

_Sooner or later, everyone would always leave her. . .everyone except Uncle Quentin._

_He came to see her all the time, at least once a month, and he always sent her pretty presents and let her have whatever she wanted._

_He was the only one she could count on, the only one it was safe to love._

"Eleanor?" Mr Faulkner touched his little charge's shoulder gently, trying to jolt her from her reminiscing. "Nell?" He said, using her nickname, as only a privileged few were permitted to.

She shook herself slightly, leaving behind the memories of the visit a year and a half ago, looking up at him with wide blue eyes.

"Maybe daydreaming isn't such a good idea when we're working with the crossbow." He chided mildly.

"I'm sorry." She bit her lip. "I was just thinking about. . ."

"Mr Travers?" He patted her shoulder sympathetically. "I know you miss them."

She nodded, scowling sullenly. "It's not fair. Why did he have to die? Why couldn't _she _die instead?"

"She? You mean your moth. . ."

"My not-a-mother." She cut him off firmly.

It was with some difficulty that Mr Faulkner refrained from rolling his eyes at the term the little girl had insisted on using since her toddler years.

"I think you're being very unfair, Nell." He was careful to keep his tone mild.

"I'm not!" She protested, stung.

"I'm fairly sure that it wouldn't physically kill you to give her a chance." He said dryly, half-forgetting her age and speaking to her as if she were another adult.

"She doesn't deserve one." Her jaw was set in a way that told him that she had no intention of budging from her position. "She didn't want me." _/Only Uncle Quentin did. /_

"It seems to me as though she wants to get to know you now." He pointed out. "I'm not saying you have to welcome her with open arms, but the least you can do is be polite when she comes over this afternoon – unless of course you _want _people to think that Mr Travers never taught you any manners." He added slyly, knowing her weakness.

"Fine!" She huffed, stomping her foot. "But I won't be _nice_."

* * *

_**That afternoon.**_

"I cannot believe that I ever worked with that man!" Giles berated himself as he paced back and forth across the reception room of Eleanor's palatial home, making the two Slayers sitting side by side on the couch slightly dizzy.

It seemed to Faith that Giles was even angrier about what they had learned of the part that Travers had played in Eleanor's conception than she was – and that was saying something.

"I worked for him while he was . . .Faith, I'm sorry."

"You're being an idiot." Faith told him, her tone kinder than her words.

"But . . ."

"It wasn't your signature on that check, was it?"

"No. . ."

"You didn't play any part in arranging it, did you?"

"Of course not!"

"And you weren't in the loop about it?"

"No, but. . ."

"But nothing!" Faith patted his shoulder gently. "It's not your fault."

"Thank you." He smiled gratefully, still feeling slightly guilty about ever being involved with an organization that could so coldly arrange the rape of a fourteen year old child and then steal the child born as a result of the assault.

"At least you'll be able to explain to Eleanor that you didn't abandon her." Buffy pointed out.

"Yes," Giles concurred. "Once she knows that Travers kidnapped her without your knowledge, it should make it easier for you to relate to her."

"No."

"I'm sure it will." Buffy tried to comfort the other girl. "Once you tell her. . ."

"I'm not going to."

"Why not?" The blonde Slayer was bewildered.

Faith smiled wistfully, remembering how fond she had been of Mayor Wilkins, despite knowing what kind of person he was, how close she had been to the man who had been the closest thing to a parent she had ever known.

Her own mother had been a disgrace to the name and news of her suicide, three months before her own daughter had been born, had come as more of a relief than a cause for grief.

Whether she liked or not, she had had no part in her daughter's life, and Eleanor hadn't even been able to form any kind of long-term attachments with the people hired to care for her.

From what she had learned, Quentin Travers had been the only person her child had ever been close to, the person she had thought she could count on.

She couldn't rob her of that.

"I can't."

"I don't understand." Giles looked agitated. "That man arranged for you to be raped, he stole your daughter and told you she was dead, then lied to her all of her life, telling her you had abandoned her. Why on Earth would you ever want to protect him?"

"I'm not." Faith said softly. "I'm protecting _her_."

* * *

Outside the room, a devastated little girl leaned against the wall, silent tears running down her cheeks, numb with shock, unable to register what she had just overheard.

They were lying, they had to be.

Uncle Quentin could never have done something like that.

He would never lie to her.

Would he?

TBC.

_Author's Note: That's all for now, folks. Reviews, as always, are more than welcome. I'm also curious about who will guess what 'S' and 'H' stand for first._


	7. Chapter 6

**Disclaimer:** Since my name is not Joss Whedon, 'Buffy: The Vampire Slayer', 'Angel' and the characters associated with the show belong to someone who in't me. I also do not own the storyline, that is taken from gidgetgirl's 'The Lost Child Challenge' (details below) posted at the Chocolate Covered Strawberries Archive.

**The Lost Child Challenge**

When Faith was fourteen, she was raped by her mother's boyfriend. After that, she left home on her own, pregnant with the rapist's child. When she was found by the Council, her first Watcher took the baby, assuring Faith that it would be taken care of... the Watcher then was killed by Kakistos before she could give Faith more information. Now, years later, the child has come back into Faith's life.

**Requirements:**

Faith dealing with mixed feelings about the child: a mother's love and the memory of the rape.  
The child having a Faith-esque attitude problem  
The council having had some hand in the child's conception  
The child having an amazing destiny  
Faith wanting to save her daughter from her own mistakes

**Author's Note I: **To dawn-roberts, pheonix452 and MsHellFire2005 - Well done! 'H' does indeed stand for Hereditary, a Slayer who inherited her Slayerness from her foremothers. 'S' stands for Spontaneus, any Slayer that isn't a Hereditary. Basically, a Slayer's daughter is always a Potential, as are all of her descendants in the female line.

**Author's Note II: **Sorry it's taken me so long to get this story updated. Am I the only one who hasn't been able to log in to over the past three days?

* * *

**Chapter 6 **

"I wonder what's taking so long. Jeeves said that she'd be right down." Faith, fed up of sitting in the room with the other three, who were staring at her as if she'd grown several extra heads since she had announced her decision not to tell little Eleanor what they had learned about Travers, stood, making her way to the door to find out what was taking so long.

Outside, the five year old heard her approach but she couldn't have moved if she had wanted to.

"Eleanor?" Faith did her best to smile. "I was just coming to look for you."

Her daughter was silent.

"Honey?" Faith asked, worriedly. "Are you alright, you didn't. . .Did you hear what we were saying in there?" The devastated look on the little girl's face was all the answer she needed. "Eleanor. . ."

The little girl dodged her mother's outstretched hand, backing away and dashing up the stairs, her blue eyes brimming with tears.

"Great!" Faith swore. "Just great!"

* * *

It wasn't true.

It _couldn't_ be.

Uncle Quentin had told her all about what had happened when she had born, how her not-a-mother had been angry when she found out that she was going to have a baby, that she hadn't wanted to listen to Uncle Quentin when he said that her baby was going to be a very special baby who was going to do a lot of good, how she had said that she didn't want a baby, that she was going to run away from the hospital and leave her there, that only he had saved her, that he had wanted her even when her not-a-mother didn't.

Uncle Quentin had been the only one she could count on, even after he was dead she had been happy to know that he was watching over her from Heaven.

Had he been lying to her?

Could Uncle Quentin have lied? Could he have hurt her mother? Could he have stolen her? Had he said that she was dead so that he could take her away?

It seemed blasphemous to even think of such a thing.

"They're lying!" She declared fiercely, glaring at her reflection in her full-length mirror.

But why would they lie?

They hadn't known that she was standing outside the room. Eleanor was pretty good at reading people and her not-a-mother had been genuinely shocked and upset to see her outside the room.

She hadn't wanted her to hear what they had said.

She hadn't wanted her to know.

Flopping down on her bed, the little girl allowed her tears to flow.

Uncle Quentin had been the one constant in her life, the only person who was always there for her, the person she could count on, the only person who really loved her.

Had all that been a lie?

She clutched her favourite teddy-bear close, remembering the day she had been given her bear, whom she had named for his donor.

_To her just turned three year old eyes, the box in front of her was huge, and her hands were too small to manage the large bow. _

_"Would you like some help with that, my little Ella?" _

_Although he carried a penknife rather than a sword, he was as much her knight in shining armour as any of the heroes of the legends that Nanny Hopkins told her as he carefully untied the broad red ribbon, handing it to her ceremoniously before slitting the wrapping paper and Sellotape to open the box, producing a plush brown teddy bear as tall as she was. _

_"Happy Birthday, little one." _

_Her eyes lit up as she took her gift into her arms, hugging it tightly. _

_"What's his name?" _

_He smiled paternally at her. "He's yours, Ella, it's your job to name him." _

_Her blue eyes were full of adoration as she looked up at him. "Mr Travers." She said decidedly. "His name's Mr Travers." _

Screaming in rage, she flung the unfortunate Mr Travers across the room, leaving him to hit the wall with a soft thud.

He had lied!

She couldn't force herself to pretend that he hadn't.

If he had lied about her mother, what else had he lied about?

He had said that he loved her.

Was that another lie?

Hearing a soft knock on the door she sat up, hastily wiping her eyes.

"Come in."

"Eleanor?" Faith approached warily, sitting gingerly on the edge of the bed. "About what you heard downstairs. . ."

"It was true wasn't it?" Eleanor regarded the young woman keenly, seeing her internal debate over what she should say. "Please don't lie to me."

"I'm sorry, it's true."

"I see." As she always did when she was upset or disturbed, she veiled her emotions with unchildlike poise and dignity. "It seems that I owe you an apology. I'm sorry."

"Don't worry about that." Faith reached out to comfort her daughter but thought better of the gesture. "Are you okay?"

"I'll be fine." The five year old insisted.

"Are you sure?"

"Tears are for the weak." She rested her chin in her hands, her eyes darkening in thought. "I should have known. Everybody always leaves me. I should have known that Uncle Quen. . .Mr Travers didn't _really _care. Is there something wrong with me?" She asked, her adult aura dropping, leaving her looking very young and very vulnerable. "Is that why nobody wants to stay with me?"

"Of course not!" Faith hastened to reassure her. "There's nothing wrong with you, I promise. I'm sure that Travers really did care about you."

"He lied to me." Her response was implacable. "He hurt you. He was a bad person."

"I'm not going to argue that point." Faith conceded. "But even bad people can care about people." Seeing her daughter's skeptical look, she hurried to elaborate. "I once knew a guy who was really bad - he wanted to be a demon."

"That was stupid of him."

"I know, but he did a lot of really bad things so that he would be able to be a demon, he hurt and killed a lot of people."

"He sounds evil."

"I suppose he was, but do you know what was funny?"

"What?"

"He cared about me. I think he even loved me."

"But you said he was bad."

"I know, but he still cared about me, he was like my dad."

"How do you know that he did?"

"I just know, deep down. I can feel it." Faith tried to find the words to explain. "Do you feel that Travers cared about you?"

Eleanor considered the question gravely. "I think so."

"Then I'm sure he did."

"What about you?" The question was tentative. "Did you. . .I mean, before, did you ever. . ." Her voice dropped to a whisper. "Want me."

"Yes." Faith told her firmly. "I was surprised when I knew that I was going to have you, but I've never hurt so much as I did when I thought you were dead." She touched her daughter's cheek gingerly, relieved that she didn't shrink away from her hand. "What do you think? Can we start again?"

Eleanor nodded slowly.

Her not-a-mother. . . no, her _mother _looked happier than any person she had ever seen before.

In an unusually impulsive gesture, the little girl reached out and gave her a small, awkward hug.

"I love you, Eleanor." Faith hugged her little girl tightly.

Looking up at her, the five year old made what was, for her, a huge concession. "You can call me Nell if you like."

TBC.


	8. Chapter 7

**Disclaimer:** Since my name is not Joss Whedon, 'Buffy: The Vampire Slayer', 'Angel' and the characters associated with the show belong to someone who in't me. I also do not own the storyline, that is taken from gidgetgirl's 'The Lost Child Challenge' (details below) posted at the Chocolate Covered Strawberries Archive.

**The Lost Child Challenge**

When Faith was fourteen, she was raped by her mother's boyfriend. After that, she left home on her own, pregnant with the rapist's child. When she was found by the Council, her first Watcher took the baby, assuring Faith that it would be taken care of... the Watcher then was killed by Kakistos before she could give Faith more information. Now, years later, the child has come back into Faith's life.

**Requirements:**

Faith dealing with mixed feelings about the child: a mother's love and the memory of the rape.  
The child having a Faith-esque attitude problem  
The council having had some hand in the child's conception  
The child having an amazing destiny  
Faith wanting to save her daughter from her own mistakes

**Author's Note I: **Were any of you wondering why I kept mentioning Rachel Knight?

**Author's Note II: **To Imzadi **- **Yes, subliminal suggestions can be quite effective. I'm sending everyone's favorite mini-cop and little lawyers on a shopping trip in the very near future.

**Author's Note III: **Tochattypandagurl – As much as I'd love to write that, I'm afraid that Travers is dead.

**Author's Note IV: **This chapter is mostly diary entries (initalics)and a flashback. I apologize in advance for excessive use of the number seven.

* * *

**Chapter 7**

_**7th September 1850**_

_At the Academy we were told that this would happen, whether sooner or later, we were warned not to allow ourselves to become emotionally involved, that the relationship between a Watcher and his Slayer inevitably ends in loss but how can I be expected to remain unmoved by the amazing woman who was a part of my life for more than nine years?_

_Doubtless my superiors will remind me that we had longer together than most Watchers and Slayers do, that I am fortunate that they did not forcibly separate us the instant they learned of our marriage, as I am certain they would have done had not my beloved faced them down like a lioness, swearing that if they attempted it she would never again stir a muscle to fight a demon, that she would do everything in her power to ensure that she lived a long life, during which they would be without a Slayer._

_I can picture her now._

_I have failed in my duty to her, failed to protect her. If I had been a better trainer, would she have been able to stop that blow before it fell. I will never be able to answer that question and, in a way, it doesn't matter, for an answer will change nothing._

_My Rachel is gone._

Willow's eyes were filled with tears as she read the pages, liberally besprinkled with tears a century and a half old, of the journal of Reginald Humphries, Watcher to the late Rachel Knight, detailing her eight year career as the Chosen One, ending in an account of her final battle against the demon cult, the Y'sept'ac.

The words of the dead Watcher drew her into the story, making her almost a spectator to events that had taken place long before she had been born.

* * *

****

**_Boston, 1850_**

Reginald had argued with her, pleaded with her to stop, insisting that she had fought long and hard enough, that they deserved a life of their own but not even the thought of her fourteen-month-old daughter could persuade her to lay down her arms.

How could she, as a mother, refuse to do her duty to ensure that the world was safe for other people's children?

Even now, face to face with the High Priest of the Y'sept'ac, his eyes alight with rage at her insolence in interrupting this sacred ritual, she had no regrets about her decision.

The chanting of the seven robed, lizard-like demons faded into the background as she circled their High Priest, striking out against him with every ounce of strength and skill she possessed, distracted more by the knowledge that two of the demons were converging on Reginald than by the seven narrow slits of light, tears in the veil that shielded this world from a thousand demon worlds, gradually widening in response to the chants.

An image of her little daughter, fast asleep in her cradle, leapt to mind and she stumbled, slightly dazed, not even seeing the High Priest's long, razor-like claw before it plunged into her back and out through her heart.

Blood spurted from the young woman's body, liberally showering the Boston ground, droplets flying in all directions, spraying the budding gateways, freezing them as they were, despite the frenzied chanting of the robed priests.

Howling in horror and rage, the High Priest dropped the young woman's limp body, neither noticing or caring as her husband flew to her side, cradling her gently in his arms, pleading with her no to leave him, trying to staunch the flow of blood, which had already slowed to a dark, sluggish trickle.

As he fell to his knees, all three of his yellow eyes burned with fury, knowing that he was thwarted.

His despair, which threatened to overwhelm him, lifted slightly in response to a thought he picked up from the distraught man.

Perhaps all was not lost.

"Stop!" He raised a clawed hand to halt his followers before they could tear the human to shreds. "Leave him!"

He smiled grimly. He was not defeated, merely delayed.

"Seven score and seven years. The seventh generation."

* * *

_**London, Watcher's Council Headquarters, 2003.**_

_**12th September 1850**_

_They tell me that Rachel did not die in vain, that her blood sealed the gateways before they could grow large enough for the demons to spill through to destroy everything that is good and beautiful about this world. Perhaps I am selfish, but this is a cold comfort when Elizabeth cries for her mother and I ache more than I ever thought possible with every breath I take._

_The demons let me go unharmed, they allowed me to take Rachel away, to give her a proper burial. It was the only thing that I could do for her._

_The Council have told me of the reasons for the Y'sept'ac's clemency, that as Rachel's blood froze the gateways, only a descendant of hers will be able to control them. The demons wished to ensure that her child would grow to womanhood._

_Rachel would laugh if she could see how the senior members of the Inner Council, after their horror and anger when they learned that she was with child, are now so relieved that Elizabeth exists, for they believe that it will be her great-great-great-great-grandchild, a seventh generation descendant of Rachel, who will be able to close the gateways of the Seven Hells._

_I leave them to their schemes. I will never serve as Watcher again, I could not bear to do so. Of Elizabeth's future I cannot be certain. She is a Potential, as her mother was when we first met, but I can only pray that she will never be called as a Slayer._

_I lost Rachel. I cannot lose our child._

"Kennedy?" Willow was surprised by how level her voice was as she called her girlfriend's name.

"What's the matter?" The young Slayer's dark eyes were concerned.

"Could you pass me Faith's file, please?"

Spreading the family tree out in front of her, Willow traced a finger through the names, doing some quick calculating regarding the date of little Eleanor's conception.

"Willow?" Kennedy sounded worried. "Is something wrong?"

"You could say that." The Wicca sighed. "I know why Travers wanted Faith's baby."

TBC.

_Author's Note: That's all for now. There'll be more interaction between Faith and Nell next chapter, but in the meantime, please review._


	9. Chapter 8

**Disclaimer:** Since my name is not Joss Whedon, 'Buffy: The Vampire Slayer', 'Angel' and the characters associated with the show belong to someone who in't me. I also do not own the storyline, that is taken from gidgetgirl's 'The Lost Child Challenge' (details below) posted at the Chocolate Covered Strawberries Archive. Nell belongs to me, as do Rachel Knight and Reginald Humphries.

**The Lost Child Challenge **

When Faith was fourteen, she was raped by her mother's boyfriend. After that, she left home on her own, pregnant with the rapist's child. When she was found by the Council, her first Watcher took the baby, assuring Faith that it would be taken care of... the Watcher then was killed by Kakistos before she could give Faith more information. Now, years later, the child has come back into Faith's life.

**Requirements:**

- Faith dealing with mixed feelings about the child: a mother's love and the memory of the rape.  
- The child having a Faith-esque attitude problem  
- The council having had some hand in the child's conception  
- The child having an amazing destiny  
- Faith wanting to save her daughter from her own mistakes

**Author's Note I: **To chattypandagurl – Didn't Travers die on the show when the Watchers were getting wiped out? I've been writing him as dead for this story, so if he didn't die on the show, he did now.

**Author's Note II: **To gidgetgirl – Just being a seventh generation descendant of Rachel wasn't enough. If you compare the date of Nell's conception (the one on the cheque) with the date of Rachel's death and factor in the High Priest of the Y'sept'ac's mention about 'seven score and seven years', you'll know why Faith's stepfather was paid to rape her. The Council also had their reasons for wanting to ensure that Nell was raised to be completely loyal to them.

**Author's Note III: **To C'est Magnifique – Yes. Well spotted.

* * *

**Chapter 8 **

_**Kent, England.**_

Nell's heart skipped a beat as the blonde Slayer approached, her hand outstretched.

Although her guardian rarely spoke about the actions of the other Potentials, or even of the Slayers, her tutors and trainers did not share his close-mouthed tendencies and Buffy Summers had become something of a legend to her.

She adored hearing the story of how brave she had been while fighting the evil goddess, Glory.

"Hi, Eleanor." Buffy smiled kindly at the little girl, unaware of the awe her presence was inspiring.

It was a moment before the five year old regained control over her tongue enough to return the greeting. "How do you do?"

"And this is Giles." Faith completed the introductions.

"A pleasure." He took her small hand in his and shook it gravely.

"Hello, Mr Giles."

"Oh, we just call him Giles." Buffy told her. "Mr Giles is to stuffy, even for him."

Giles would have made a scathing reply, but his cellphone chose that moment to ring and he left the room to answer it. When he returned, a couple of minutes later, his face was taut with anger.

"Giles?" Buffy was concerned. "What's the matter? What happened?"

"Willow and Kennedy have made considerable progress with their research." He nodded, almost imperceptibly, in Nell's direction. "Willow asked that we return to the Council Headquarters as soon as possible."

Faith took her daughter's hand in hers. "Nell, honey, could you ask Mrs Perkins to come in here please."

"I will." She left the room in search of her nanny.

"Faith. . ." Giles began.

"Save it. I'm not leaving her here. Not a chance."

"You must realize that they won't want to allow you to take her away from here."

Her expression was dark. "I wouldn't recommend that they try to stop me."

* * *

****

**_London, Watcher's Council Headquarters_**

"Faith, she's adorable." Willow said affectionately, looking across to the other end of the large room, where Xander was entertaining little Nell, distracting her from the conversation of her elders.

"You said that you had some more information on Eleanor." GileS interjected, wanting to know what she hadn't been prepared to tell him over the phone.

"Right." Willow picked up the diary in her hands. "You read the diaries, you know who Reginald Humphries was, don't you."

"Of course." He sounded vaguely offended. "Rachel Knight's Watcher."

"Her Watcher. . .and her husband." She smiled at the dark haired Slayer. "You have some Watcher blood in you, Faith."

"Wonderful." The response was sarcastic.

"Is there more of a connection between Rachel and Eleanor than we originally thought?" Giles pressed.

"You could say that." The red haired Wicca conceded. "She's the reason the Council wanted Eleanor to be conceived."

* * *

The Honorable Emerence Marsh-Hadley glowered at the group as she sat down in front of them.

"This is unacceptable, Mr Giles. This information has been classified for a reason and you have no right..."

"I think I have the right to find out everything there is to know about my child." Faith interrupted. "And the way I'm feeling right now, I wouldn't recommend that you push me on this."

"You might want to listen to her." Buffy advised helpfully. "When she's mad, it isn't pretty."

"This is absurd." The middle-aged woman turned to Giles. "You cannot possibly allow this!"

"I think under the circumstances, I could be persuaded to turn a blind eye." Giles responded coolly, knowing that Faith was perilously close to being willing to carry out her threats and wanting to intimidate the woman into answering before it came to that.

"You might be a member of the High Council of Watchers or whatever, but it's not like there are that many of you left." Buffy pointed out. "Is it really worth fighting on this? If you were in Faith's position, wouldn't you want to know."

"Or should she just take Eleanor with her and leave, cutting off all contact with the Council." Willow suggested.

Ms Marsh-Hadley looked genuinely alarmed by that prospect, as the Wicca had suspected she would be. "You can't!"

"Why not?" Willow asked softly, using her abilities to give the woman a slight 'nudge'. "Tell us."

* * *

"...Miss Knight had been fighting against the Y'sept'ac cult for years, as the three Slayers before her had." Ms Marsh-Hadley narrated in a low, even voice. "Had their quest succeeded, Hell on Earth would have been unleashed. That could not be allowed to happen."

"Their quest?" Buffy raised a questioning eyebrow.

"They were dedicated to opening gateways into seven demon dimensions, the Seven Hells, allowing their inhabitants to enter our world at will."

"The Hellmouth." Giles supplied.

"Times seven." Willow finished.

"Their ritual could only take place at a certain time, every three hundred and forty-three years. They could only make one attempt. If that failed, it was over."

"But didn't Rachel stop them?" Kennedy questioned.

"Their ritual had already begun." The older woman told them. "The gateways had begun to open, Miss Knight's death only froze them."

"The doors were left ajar?" Giles suggested.

"Correct, Mr Giles." She nodded her approval of his choice of words. "The demons of the Seven Hells have been able to squeeze through at times, but the portals have never been able to be opened. The Y'sept'ac prophecy dictates that only a seventh generation descendant of the one who sealed the gateways, conceived seven score and seven years after her death, will be able to control them, to seal them and ensure that the demons of the Seven Hells will never be able to do any further damage."

"Rachel died on September seventh 1850." Willow supplied.

"Exactly one hundred and forty-seven years before. . ." Faith couldn't continue the sentence.

"You were the only direct sixth generation descendant of childbearing years." Ms Marsh-Hadley addressed Faith. "Your child had to be conceived in order to save the lives of innocents, surely you understand. What happened was regrettable, but necessary." She finished self-righteously.

"Regrettable." The dark haired Slayer echoed humorlessly, trying to block the memories of what had happened to her almost six years previously, to keep the tears and the rage she felt brewing inside her from surfacing.

"I'm pleased to see that you understand." The older woman rose. "If this interrogation is complete, I have work to do." She stalked away, clearly unhappy at having had to tell the story.

"I can't believe these people!" Kennedy complained. "We don't still have to work with them, do we?"

"What I don't get is why those Y'sep. . . whatever they're called guys didn't try to stop the prophecy from coming through." Buffy said. "I mean, even a partially open portal is better for them than none at all, right?"

"Don't you see?" Faith asked. "Nell is the only one who can control their gateways - and you can do more to a door that close it."

TBC.

_Author's Note: This was more an explanation chapter than enything else. I'll update as soon as I can. In the meantime, please review._


	10. Chapter 9

**Disclaimer:** Since my name is not Joss Whedon, 'Buffy: The Vampire Slayer', 'Angel' and the characters associated with the show belong to someone who in't me. I also do not own the storyline, that is taken from gidgetgirl's 'The Lost Child Challenge' (details below) posted at the Chocolate Covered Strawberries Archive. Nell belongs to me, as do Rachel Knight and Reginald Humphries.

**The Lost Child Challenge **

When Faith was fourteen, she was raped by her mother's boyfriend. After that, she left home on her own, pregnant with the rapist's child. When she was found by the Council, her first Watcher took the baby, assuring Faith that it would be taken care of... the Watcher then was killed by Kakistos before she could give Faith more information. Now, years later, the child has come back into Faith's life.

**Requirements:**

- Faith dealing with mixed feelings about the child: a mother's love and the memory of the rape.  
- The child having a Faith-esque attitude problem  
- The council having had some hand in the child's conception  
- The child having an amazing destiny  
- Faith wanting to save her daughter from her own mistakes

**Author's Note I: **To Imzadi - I know, it was horrible of them. The main reason they didn't go with the far more humane alternatives you suggested was that they - or, more specifically, Travers - wanted to ensure that Nell would have no loyalty save to him. Remember what Willow said about her staff turnover?

**Author's Note II:** To C'est Magnifique - No, she can't. Once the portal's open, nobody can control the demons who escape. I'm afraid that poor Mr Travers is in disgrace at the moment, still lying where Nell threw him.

* * *

**Chapter 9**

"They're talking about me, aren't they?"

"I'm sure they're not." Xander assured her unconvincingly. "It's probably just research. Very boring."

Nell regarded him primly. "Uncle Quen. . ." A look of pain crossed her face. "I mean, Mr Travers said that a Slayer should always study hard and do her own research. That way, she is always prepared."

"Really?" Xander looked thoughtful. "And what else did he say a Slayer has to do?"

"She has to train every day and work really hard at her lessons because it's important that she be intelligent as well as strong. Like Buffy." She added with a slight note of hero worship.

"I see." Xander winked at the little girl. "I bet I know one thing that your tutors never taught you."

"What?" She asked curiously.

He gave her a broad grin. "The Snoopy Dance."

* * *

"Check out Xander."Buffy nudged her best friend, gesturing towards the enthusiastically dancing Xander and his audience of one.

"He's been practicing." Willow noted seriously. "He's gotten much better."

Kennedy raised a surprised eyebrow. "This is _better_?"

Even Giles allowed a small smile to cross his features.

Nell seemed torn between bewilderment and amusement at the spectacle before her

Faith watched, smiling sadly, as Xander coaxed the little girl to try her hand at the dance, instructing her diligently in the art of the perfect Scooby dance, listening to her soft giggles as she stumbled midway through the routine.

"Are you okay?" Buffy asked the other girl, seeing the serious expression on her face.

"Fine." Faith responded, not taking her eyes off her daughter. "It's just. . .this is the first time I've seen her be a kid."

* * *

"Are you absolutely positive about this prophecy, Giles?" Faith demanded of the Watcher. "It has to be Nell, there's no possible way that I could do this for her?"

"I'm sorry." His tone was genuinely regretful. "You are a sixth generation descendent of Rachel, and your date of conception does not match the one in the prophecy. If your daughter doesn't close the portals, the Seven Hells will remain open."

"But there's no specific time frame for when she has to do it?" The dark haired Slayer pressed. "She doesn't have to do it right away? We can wait until she's older, can't we?"

"We could." Giles allowed, his expression sympathtic as he regarded the anxious girl. "But we cannot know what will happen between now and the future, how many demons will manage to squeeze through the opening, how much damge they will do, how many people they will kill and, what if, God forbid, something happens to Eleanor, if she doesn't reach adulthood?"

Faith swallowed a lump forming in her throat.

She had mourned her daughter for five years, the mere thought of losing her was like a physical blow.

"Besides," Giles continued gently. "Once the Seven Hells have been closed, permanently, the Council will have no further use for Eleanor, no reason to fight to keep her. You will be free to take your daughter away from all of this."

"I guess." Her tone was dubious. "About the prophecy. . .does it say anything about Nell having to be alone?"

"Not a thing." Giles smiled. "We wouldn't miss this for the world."

* * *

****

**_Boston, underground._**

Sitting at the centre of a chanting circle of demons, a robed priest opened his eyes, leavingthe state of meditation he had entered to induce a vision, a satisfied smile playing across his scaly features.

"My lord?" An acolyte inclined his head respectfully. "Have you seen what is to come."

"I have." His voice was deep. "The One approaches. Soon She will be with us."

TBC.


	11. Chapter 10

**Disclaimer:** Since my name is not Joss Whedon, 'Buffy: The Vampire Slayer', 'Angel' and the characters associated with the show belong to someone who in't me. I also do not own the storyline, that is taken from gidgetgirl's 'The Lost Child Challenge' (details below) posted at the Chocolate Covered Strawberries Archive.

**The Lost Child Challenge**

When Faith was fourteen, she was raped by her mother's boyfriend. After that, she left home on her own, pregnant with the rapist's child. When she was found by the Council, her first Watcher took the baby, assuring Faith that it would be taken care of... the Watcher then was killed by Kakistos before she could give Faith more information. Now, years later, the child has come back into Faith's life.

**Requirements:**

**- **Faith dealing with mixed feelings about the child: a mother's love and the memory of the rape.  
- The child having a Faith-esque attitude problem  
- The council having had some hand in the child's conception  
- The child having an amazing destiny  
- Faith wanting to save her daughter from her own mistakes

**Author's Note I: **To gidgetgirl - Travers disliked Buffy, but a few of Nell's trainers were fans.

**Author's Note II: **To C'est Magnifique - Mr Travers the Bear will reappear soon. Your idea of pairing Faith and Xander is a good one.

* * *

Chapter 10 

"I'd better make this clear right now, Giles. If whatever Nell has to do to close this portal is in any way dangerous, we're not going through with it." Faith warned, scowling at the scroll Giles was perusing. "The damn portals can stay wide open for all I care."

"Fair enough." He acknowledged, straightening his glasses. "It's fairly straightforward. The portal was sealed with blood, so to open it. . ."

"Forget it!"

"A drop is all that will be needed." Giles hasted to assure her. "That will be enough to establish Nell's control over the Gateways. What happens after that will depend entirely on one thing."

"What?"

"Whatever it is Nell wants to happen."

* * *

**_Boston, underground. _**

"For millennia we have waited for this day." The leader of the Y'espt'ac intoned, addressing his assembled clan, now sadly diminished. "When the Great Ones will enter this world and lay waste to the unworthy." He bowed his head reverently and was silent a moment before looking up again, a fierce expression on his face. "They tried to stop this day from coming. They sent their Champions to thwart us, but even then we were not defeated. Through the foresight of my predecessor, we were able to plan for this glorious day, when She will fling open the Gateways and release the Great Ones." He narrowed his eyes as he scanned the ranks of demons before him. "They will arrive soon, but take care. The One is but a child. She is not to be harmed. If She dies, it is over."

* * *

_London._

Faith paused to knock before entering the bedroom that had been readied for Nell while they were staying at the Council's headquarters.

"Enter." The little girl looked up from unpacking her bag, smiling shyly when she saw who her visitor was. "Hello."

"Hi, honey." Faith gingerly sat down on the side of the four poster bed. The rooms had clearly been designed more for elegence than for comfort. "Do you need some help with that?"

"Please." Her dainty nose wrinkled in distaste when she saw what was lying on top of her dresses and, touching it as little as possible, she tossed it aside.

"Hey, now," Faith bent down to pick the teddy bear up. "Who's this? What did he do to piss you off?"

"That," Nell spoke coldly as she glared at the unfortunate bear. "Is Mr Travers. I don't like him anymore."

"Did Travers give him to you?" Faith asked gently.

"For my birthday." Nell confirmed. "When I was three." She took Mr Travers from her mother, clutching him reflexively. "Mr Trav. . . Uncle Quen. . . you know who I mean. . .he wasn't always able to come to visit a lot, but he always came for my birthday, except for the last one." She bit her lip, remembering the horrible feelings that had assaulted her when she had been told that her adored guardian was dead. "He helped me open the box. My hands were too little. He said that he was mine and that I should be the one to name him, so I called him Mr Travers after him. Then when Uncle Quen. . .when he was away and I was all by myself, when I wanted to talk to him and he wasn't there, I talked to Mr Travers." She blinked furiously to keep the tears from shedding, ashamed of her weakness.

"Nell. . ."

"It doesn't matter now." The five year old cut her off firmly, marching across to the window and trying to open the latch, fully intending to hurl the luckless Mr Travers out.

Faith caught her daughter's hand gently, restraining her. "Don't."

"I don't want him! I don't love him anymore. I hate him!" Nell declared passionately, losing her battle against tears. "He gave Mr Travers to me but he lied to me! He was bad!"

"I know." Faith said quietly, slowly drawing her daughter into her arms. "I know. It's hard to find out that someone you trusted lied to you." She stroked her daughter's hair. "But you loved Mr Travers, the bear one, I mean, before you found out, didn't you?"

"He was my friend." Nell admitted quietly.

"Baby," She paused, trying to find the words to explain it in a way that a child could grasp. "Even if the person who gave you Mr Travers is bad, it doesn't make Mr Travers himself bad. From what you've told me, he was there for you when you needed a friend wasn't he? Just because something comes from a bad person doesn't mean that it can't be good and beautiful."

Inwardly, she smiled wryly at the memory of her fourteen year old self, the girl who had been so certain that she would hate the baby growing inside of her because of the circumstances of its conception.

Constance had told her the same thing, almost word for word, when she had coaxed her away from the abortion clinic.

Regardless of what her late Watcher had done, she would never cease to be grateful to her for that.

"I guess it's not his fault who gave him to me." Nell conceded reluctantly, smoothing down Mr Travers' mussed fur. She kissed the top of his head, reflecting guiltily on how lonely he must have been when she wouldn't talk to him. She kissed him a second time, just to be sure that he knew that she wasn't mad at him, whispering, so quietly that only Slayer hearing could have picked it up. "I love you."

_/And I love you, Nell. /_ Faith told her daughter silently. _/More than anything. You have no idea how much I don't want to do this. / _

"Sweetie?" She drew a deep breath as Nell turned to look up at her with enquiring eyes. "There's something I need to talk to you about."

* * *

****

**_Kent, England, 2002. _**

****

_Her dark, shoulder length curls danced as she proudly demonstrated her newly learned sparring abilities to her admiring audience. _

_Her smile was bright and her normally pale cheeks were slightly flushed with exertion as she finished the exercise flawlessly and ran over to where Uncle Quentin was sitting. _

_"Did you see?" _

_"I saw, Ella." He smiled indulgently at his little ward, delighted with the progress she had made. _

_That Kendra would die and Eleanor's mother would be called as the little girl was born had been unexpected, as had the effect the rogue Slayer's calling would have on her daughter. They had known that the little girl would be a Potential, but the additional Slayer traits she had developed had been a surprise, and a very pleasant one. _

_Nell, though not quite four, knew, for she had often been told, that she was a very special little girl. _

_It wasn't that she might one day be called as a Slayer, or even that she already seemed to be halfway there. _

_She was special because of what she had been chosen to do long before she was born. _

_She was special because one day she would be the only one who would able to stop the bad people letting monsters into the world. _

_She was special because one day she would save the world._

* * *

A little over a year later, she saw that that was why he had always been so nice to her, why it had even seemed like he loved her.

In a way, Nell supposed that her guardian really had loved her but it had always been because of what she was going to do, never for herself.

She barely heard Faith's explanations about what she wanted her to do and why she wanted her to do it, or her assurances that she, and the others, would be right there with her, that she wouldn't be alone.

She had thought that her mother loved her, _really_ loved her.

She had been wrong.

Her mother was just like Uncle Quentin.

Her voice was cold as she responded to her mother's question. "I understand."

TBC.

_Author's Note: That's it for now, but please don't forget to review. This is one of the few stories I have written that's notmostly fluff, so I want to know how I'm doing._


	12. Chapter 11

**Disclaimer:** Since my name is not Joss Whedon, 'Buffy: The Vampire Slayer', 'Angel' and the characters associated with the show belong to someone who in't me. I also do not own the storyline, that is taken from gidgetgirl's 'The Lost Child Challenge' (details below) posted at the Chocolate Covered Strawberries Archive. Nell belongs to me, as do Rachel Knight and Reginald Humphries.

**The Lost Child Challenge **

When Faith was fourteen, she was raped by her mother's boyfriend. After that, she left home on her own, pregnant with the rapist's child. When she was found by the Council, her first Watcher took the baby, assuring Faith that it would be taken care of... the Watcher then was killed by Kakistos before she could give Faith more information. Now, years later, the child has come back into Faith's life.

**Requirements:**

- Faith dealing with mixed feelings about the child: a mother's love and the memory of the rape.  
- The child having a Faith-esque attitude problem  
- The council having had some hand in the child's conception  
- The child having an amazing destiny  
- Faith wanting to save her daughter from her own mistakes

**Author's Note II: **I know that it's been a while since I updated this, or any, story, so in honour of the holiday season, I'm posting a new chapter. Happy Holidays to all reviewers.

* * *

**Chapter 11**

**_Watcher's Council Jet_**

"All those years they made us fly coach when they had this at their disposal." Giles groused, scowling at the oppulent surroundings of the Watcher's Council's private jet. "Travers certainly liked his comfort."

"Maybe you weren't enough of an asshole to be allowed use it." Faith suggested.

Giles was slightly mollified by this but he would still have liked to be able to complain to one of the late members of the Inner Council about their miserly habits. He had had to sit next to a crying child on three separate occasions for Heaven's sake!

"Giles," Faith's voice was soft as she glanced towards the other side of the plane, where Nell was sitting curled up, fast asleep. "Do you think that there'll be any problems about me getting custody? They won't try to keep her, will they?" If he answered in the affirmative, she knew that once they were finished in Boston, she and Nell would not be getting back on the plane.

"Travers named several people as guardians for Nell in his will." Giles told her. "As these people are all deceased, I can't see how anyone else would be able to claim custody ahead of her mother, not if they want to stay in business. For the first time since the insitute of Watcher was founded, Slayers outnumber Watchers. They will need you, Buffy, Kennedy and all of the other former Potentials if they wish to stay in business. Once the Seven Hells are closed, Nell will not be so valuable as to risk all that."

"That's good."

"There's something else." Giles removed his glasses and polished them, not certain how to begin, not certain how the dark haired Slayer would react to the mews he was about to give her. "Travers left the house in Kent to Nell, together with most of his property."

"And you think that the Council might use that as an excuse to hang onto Nell?"

"No, I doubt it." He assured her quickly.

"Then I guess we'll have to deal with that when we get back - or we can wait until Nell's eighteen and let her deal with it." Faith had no idea what would be involved in sorting out her daughter's inheritance and she had a feeling that she didn't want to know.

She guessed that this had been Travers' way of showing that he cared for Nell, that he wanted to ensure her future and, much as she hated the man, she understood that he had loved her daughter, at least as much as he was able to.

* * *

_"Ella?" A soft voice spoke in her dreams. "Hear me, little one."_

_Her eyes widened as a tall demon, robed in black approached her. The others sat around in their seats on the plane, reading or talking quietly, not seeing the new arrival._

_"Do not be frightened." He knelt before her. "We will not harm you."_

_"I'm not afraid." She told him with dignity. "And don't call me Ella. **He** called me that. I don't want to be called that again.My name is Eleanor."_

_"Your Uncle Quentin." It wasn't a question._

_"I don't want to talk about him."_

_"I know he hurt you very much." The demon's monstrous visage somehow managed to appear sympathetic and non-threatening. "He pretended to love you so that he could get you to do what he wanted you to do. That's why he wanted you, that's why he made sure you were born."_

_Against her will, Nell's eyes sought out her mother._

_"That's why she wants you too, isn't it? You can sense it. She tries to pretend, like Uncle Quentin did, but you know. Once you've done what she wants. . ."_

_The little girl's stomach knotted with dread. Once her purpose was fulfilled, why would anybody want her? Why would anybody love her?_

_"We love you." He said, as if he had read her mind. "We always have, ever since we sensed that you lived, before you were even born. You are special, you were chosen, you are the One. We worship you." He took her tiny hand and kissed it. She didn't pull away._

_"You do?"_

_"We do. All my brethren want is to be able to see you. We will love you forever."_

_She felt herself stir, begin to wake. His voice echoed in her head._

_"You will know what to do."_

_

* * *

_

_**Boston, underground**_

"Master?" An Kra'ma'ten acolyte hovered around the leader as he emerged from his trance. "Did She hear you?"

His smile was cold. "She heard."

* * *

****

**_Watcher's Council Jet_**

"You know, if you're going to pretend to be asleep, it works better if you don't keep opening your eyes to look around."

Nell scowled at Xander's helpful whisper. "I wasn't pretending."

"Kiddo, you're talking to a master of the art - do you have any idea how many research breaks I got because Giles thought that I was asleep and didn't have the heart to wake me?"

She didn't respond.

"Your mom would probably like to talk to you."

"She's talking to Mr Giles." Her tone was cold.

"Somehow, I think that she'd rather talk to you. Mr Giles is. . .well, boring."

"I already know what she wants me to do in Boston."

"That's not all she wants to talk about. . ."

"It is." Nell cut him off with a firm gesture. "I know what I have to do."

TBC.


	13. Chapter 12

**Disclaimer:** Since my name is not Joss Whedon, 'Buffy: The Vampire Slayer', 'Angel' and the characters associated with the show belong to someone who in't me. I also do not own the storyline, that is taken from gidgetgirl's 'The Lost Child Challenge' (details below) posted at the Chocolate Covered Strawberries Archive. 

**The Lost Child Challenge**

When Faith was fourteen, she was raped by her mother's boyfriend. After that, she left home on her own, pregnant with the rapist's child. When she was found by the Council, her first Watcher took the baby, assuring Faith that it would be taken care of... the Watcher then was killed by Kakistos before she could give Faith more information. Now, years later, the child has come back into Faith's life.

**Requirements:**

- Faith dealing with mixed feelings about the child: a mother's love and the memory of the rape.  
- The child having a Faith-esque attitude problem  
- The council having had some hand in the child's conception  
- The child having an amazing destiny  
- Faith wanting to save her daughter from her own mistakes

**

* * *

**

**Chapter 12 **

Though Nell's eyes remained stubbornly closed, Xander knew perfectly well that she was wide awake and continued to speak quietly. When he had said his piece and seen that she had no intention of responding to his words, he sighed and moved away.

"You need to talk to your daughter." He told Faith the moment Giles paused in his explanation of the formalities that would be involved in the transfer of custody long enough to let him get a word in.

"Is something wrong?" She rose immediately, alarmed.

"She's upset." Xander said, softly enough so that Nell wouldn't hear him. "And I'd say that she's feeling pretty overwhelmed."

"I'm not surprised." Giles murmured sympathetically. "To be handed the power to destroy the world or to shield it forever from a significant threat, and at so young an age." He shook his head. "It would be a difficult thing for anybody to have to deal with, let alone a child..."

"Not just that." Xander met Faith's eyes, willing her to get what he was saying.

She got it.

Learning that her daughter had lived, that she was a mother, had filled her with joy but it have been frightening as well as amazing to have the child she had thought dead restored to her. Even now that she had adjusted to the news somewhat, the prospect of motherhood was a scary one, the idea that she might, despite her good intentions, wind up like her own mother or resent her daughter for the circumstances of her conception a terrifying one.

To a five year old child, brought up in luxurious isolation with every physical, intellectual and material need cared for, but neglected emotionally, prevented from forming longterm bonds with anybody save the guardian whose memory she hated, it would be infinitely more difficult to cope with.

"Nell?" Faith laid a gentle hand on her daughter's shoulder, wincing inwardly when she felt the child stiffen at her touch and pull away. "I think we need to talk."

"There is nothing I wish to talk to you about." Nell's tone was cool, her posture stiff as she turned towards her mother.

"Probably not, but there are some things I want… need to explain. I'm not good at this, you know? I haven't had any experience with the whole mom thing. My mother… let's just say she's not someone I'd go to for parenting tips, even if she was still around. Constance was probably the closest thing to a real mom I ever had and ever she…"

"She helped to steal me, didn't she?"

"Yeah." Even though she knew what had happened, Faith was having trouble coming to terms with the knowledge that the woman she had trusted had betrayed her.

"That's why Uncle… why he gave me her name as well as his mother's. He told me that she helped him rescue me when you didn't want a baby." She frowned, biting her lower lip. "That was a lie."

"I'm sorry."

"Why?" her daughter's blue eyes met hers for the first time since the beginning of their conversation. "You didn't want them to take me away. You didn't know, you thought I was dead."

"That doesn't stop me being sorry." Faith tried to verbalize her thoughts in such a way that the little girl could understand her. "I didn't want them to take you, never, but I'm sorry that they did. I'm sorry that I believed Constance and I'm sorry that I didn't make them let me see you. Most of all, I'm sorry that I wasn't here for so long."

"It wasn't your fault." Nell told her solemnly, thawing slightly.

"Thank you." Faith hesitated before broaching the subject of what was to happen when they landed. "Nell, honey, about Boston…"

Nell's expression became stony, her defenses reasserting themselves with a vengeance.

She had almost believed her.

Her guardian had been telling her the story of the Seven Hells, of her ancestress' death and of her destiny there for as long as she could remember and even as a toddler she had loved to hear the story and been proud to be so special.

She was older now, and wiser. Now she could see the truth.

The man she had adored and idolized from babyhood hadn't loved her, not truly. If he had loved her at all, he had loved her as Rachel Knight's heiress, as the champion who would save the world from the Seven Hells, never as Nell.

She had thought, hoped that her mother would be different but all she was interested in was closing the Seven Hells.

She wasn't going to make the same mistake again.

"It's alright." Nell was surprised by how calm her voice was. "I understand what you want me to do."

* * *

**_Boston _**

"I was expecting company." Buffy observed as the group reached the coordinates they had been given for the gateways. "Company of the slimy, scaly, bad guy variety."

"Perhaps we should be thankful for small mercies." Giles suggested, though he, like the others, remained alert.

After seven years of demon fighting, they all knew better than to let their guard down. Appearances could be deceptive.

The hairs on the back of Nell's neck stood on end and turning she could see spectre-like demons smile and bow their heads.

_'We are here, little one.'_ A soft breeze caressed her cheek as the Kra'ma'ten whispered to her. _'You know what to do.' _

"This is the place." Nell was sure of it. She pointed to a spot a few feet in front of her. "Right there."

"How does she…" A nudge from her sister cut Dawn off.

"That's right." Giles smiled encouragingly. Nell allowed him to take her hand in his and lead her over to the spot she had indicated. He knelt in front of her, producing a small plastic box containing sterile needles and swabs. "This is going to sting a little, I'm afraid." He warned.

"I'm not afraid. I know what to do." Nell set her jaw, holding out her right hand so Giles could clean her index finger with an alcohol swab before pricking it with a needle. She didn't see Faith wince as he did this. Fascinated, she watched a drop of blood bead on her finger, then she shook her hand experimentally, scattering tiny droplets around her.

It was strange.

She could see her mother, Giles and the others, even hear them if she strained her ears, could see the Kra'ma'ten ranged on the other side, smiling at her but the instant her blood hit the ground, it was as if a veil had fallen, separating her from them.

"We're between worlds." A kind voice explained, then a face she had seen only in portraits smiled down at her. "Hello, Nell. Do you know who I am?"

"Yes. You're my great-great-great…" Nell began, carefully counting out the greats.

Her ancestress laughed. "Perhaps we should leave it as Grandmother Rachel, dear child."

"Very well." Nell studied her companion quizzically. "I thought that you were dead… I mean, you don't look like a ghost." She explained hastily, not wanting to offend.

"I am not a ghost, Nell." Rachel smiled ruefully. "In truth, I do not know what I am."

"Have you always been here?"

"Since the night I fell in battle. I have been keeping watch over the gateways, waiting."

"For me."

"Yes."

"You want me to close the gateways, don't you?" Nell's tone was accusing.

"Yes, but ultimately what I want is irrelevant, what matters is what you want and I do not think that you know yet what you want to do."

"You don't know me!" Nell protested, stung. "How do you know that I haven't decided what I'm going to do?"

"Because, my dear, if you had, I would not still be here."

"Will you have to go away once I decide?"

"Yes. If you close the gateways, the work I began so long ago will be complete. Should you choose to open them…" Rachel shuddered. "I cannot remain to see what will happen."

"You want me to close the gateways, that's all you want." Nell said sullenly. "You're just like him… and her." She pointed at Faith.

"You are wrong about your mother, little one. She loves you deeply, she would never have brought you here if she did not think that it would be the only way that she could keep you, to make sure that you were safe."

"Why should I believe you? You left your baby, didn't you?"

"Yes, and I have missed her every moment since."

"Why did you keep fighting? Didn't you know that your baby would be all on her own if you died?"

"Not alone, she had a wonderful father who loved her very much." Rachel sighed. "Very few Slayers ever have children; it was not until Elizabeth was born that I truly understood why. Most of the billions who live on this planet do not know that they share their world with vampires, demons and monsters and, if they are fortunate, they will never have any reason to know. These people need to be protected and that task falls to she who is chosen as Slayer. While I lived, no other could be called – although that seems to have changed now." She smiled faintly. "I wanted nothing more than to stay with my family, to be a mother to Elizabeth, to love her and to watch her learn and grow, but it could not be about what I wanted. Thousands, perhaps more, could have died had I chosen to abandon my mission. I could not put myself first, anymore than you can now."

Behind her ancestress, Nell could see the Kra'ma'ten through the veil separating her from the real world, could see them smile, warm and encouraging. They wanted something from her too, but they had been honest about it, never tried to hide their motivations.

They would love her forever if she helped them.

"You are wrong about your mother." Rachel's voice cut into her musings. "You must believe that she loves you."

"How can you know?"

"I am a mother, my dear, I can see it on her face." Nell was unconvinced. Rachel's gaze fixed on Xander. "This one is wise beyond his years, he can see the truth."

_The leather upholstery squeaked slightly as she burrowed into the seat, keeping her eyes tightly shut, hoping that even if he didn't believe that she had fallen asleep, he would at least leave her be._

_Her wishes went unanswered, he did not move away. He spoke quietly, his words intended only for her ears and, though she would have liked to, she couldn't tune him out. _

_"You know, kiddo, I'm not a Slayer – obviously – or a Watcher. I'm not a vampire or a demon or a werewolf, I can't use magic like Willow can and I don't have a destiny the way Dawn had, the way you do. I'm just a regular guy and it was hard not to feel like the odd man out, to wonder where I fit in, what I brought to the group." He paused for a moment and Nell could sense from his tone that he was smiling. "But somebody very wise once told me that I did have a gift; I could see things… as hard as that may be to believe." He joked, pointing at his eyepatch. Nell didn't smile, didn't move a muscle. "Tough crowd. I know that you have some trouble trusting people, and I can't blame you for that but you should know that your mother loves you. I'm the guy who sees, and I have never seen her smile at anybody the way she does around you. I've known your mother almost as long as you've been alive, and I haven't seen her care about anybody as much as she does about you." His hand touched her shoulder briefly before he moved away. _

Why should she believe him? Or Grandmother Rachel? Or her mother?

When she knew that the man she had loved and trusted for the five years of her life had lied to her, why should she believe the words of people she barely knew?

For all she knew, they were lying too.

Her mother's expression spoke of her worry, but was she worried for her daughter's safety, or just worried that she wouldn't close the gateways the way they all wanted her to?

The Kra'ma'ten, invisible to everybody but her, continued to smile, silently willing her to fling open the portals and promising their undying devotion.

Grandmother Rachel was silent, watching like the others, waiting to see what she would decide.

Nell's finger stung slightly and the air around her crackled with what felt like static electricity. This was what she had been chosen for, a plan laid out long before she was born. The gateways to the Seven Hells were hers to command. Only she could control what happened.

She knew what to do.

TBC.

_Author's Note: That's all for now. I hope that the next (probably last) part of this story will be out a lot faster than this last part, and that the updates I have planned for other Buffy/Angel WIPs can come soon. In the meantime, please review._


	14. Epilogue

**Disclaimer:** Since my name is not Joss Whedon, 'Buffy: The Vampire Slayer', 'Angel' and the characters associated with the show belong to someone who in't me. I also do not own the storyline, that is taken from gidgetgirl's 'The Lost Child Challenge' (details below) posted at the Chocolate Covered Strawberries Archive. Nell belongs to me, as do Rachel Knight and Reginald Humphries.

**The Lost Child Challenge**

When Faith was fourteen, she was raped by her mother's boyfriend. After that, she left home on her own, pregnant with the rapist's child. When she was found by the Council, her first Watcher took the baby, assuring Faith that it would be taken care of... the Watcher then was killed by Kakistos before she could give Faith more information. Now, years later, the child has come back into Faith's life.

**Requirements:**

- Faith dealing with mixed feelings about the child: a mother's love and the memory of the rape.  
- The child having a Faith-esque attitude problem  
- The council having had some hand in the child's conception  
- The child having an amazing destiny  
- Faith wanting to save her daughter from her own mistakes

* * *

**Epilogue**

_**One year later**_

When the idea had first been broached, she had had her reservations. She had agreed, though her mother had made sure that she understood that it was her choice, and that she was in no way obliged to accept Giles' suggestion and, after an initial period of adjustment, she had been very glad that she had.

The estate her former guardian had bequeathed to her, her home since babyhood, boasted extensive grounds, a huge, palatial house and a staff paid for out of a trust Travers had established on her behalf. It was much too big for just her, even after her mother had moved in, and Giles had suggested that it would have made an ideal home for some of the younger girls who had been rescued from death at the hands of those who would have wiped out the Slayer line, at least until they were older and could begin training in earnest.

Giles, Xander and Willow, along with her mother and the staff who had had charge of Nell, all took a hand in the education and preliminary training of the seven little Slayers in their charge.

Buffy had joked that they were setting up a Slayer boarding school. She, together with Willow and Andrew, had taken responsibility for the older Slayers, choosing their Watchers and overseeing their training and welfare.

The fact that most of the youngest new Slayers had been orphans had been Nell's chief reason for agreeing to Giles' suggestion, though she had never said so in her mother's hearing for fear of hurting her feelings.

Although she had been aware that her mother was still alive, Nell had felt as if she had never truly had one until after their meeting a year previously.

At six, she was more than a year younger than the youngest of the other girls who shared her house, her tutors and her trainers but she was proud of the fact that she was well able to keep up with them. As well as having had the advantage of beginning her training years before they had, when she had barely begun to walk, Giles had explained to her that because the time of her birth had coincided with the time of her mother's calling as Slayer, she had been given an extra dose of Slayer powers.

A Slayer and a half, Xander had called her.

She wasn't sure how she felt about being special.

She had been unique all her life, it seemed.

She hadn't told anyone about seeing Rachel Knight in Boston the previous year, and had never let anyone know that she had been tempted, however briefly, to open the Seven Hells and to unleash their evil into the world, but there were times when she wondered if Xander had suspected what she had been thinking.

He had told the truth when he described himself as being able to see what others did not. He always knew when Nell, or one of the other girls, was upset or worried about something, even if nobody else noticed.

If he knew her secret, he had never let on.

The Y'sep'tac had faded away when the portals had closed, their impotent raging invisible to everyone else.

For a brief, horrible instant Nell had been terrified that that they would kill her for failing them, that they would drag her back with them to the Seven Hells but they had been unable to harm her.

She liked to think that Grandmother Rachel had been protecting her.

At her request, her ancestress' portrait had been moved from the library to her play room – one of the first changes she had insisted on when they returned from Boston was that it no longer be referred to as her day nursery – and placed above the fireplace so that Nell could imagine that she was watching her.

Her bear, Mr Travers, resplendent in a jaunty cap and coat Dawn had brought when she last visited, was cuddled in Nell's lap as she sat in her window seat, her attention half on the book she held, half on her own thoughts.

Even she wasn't sure how she felt about Mr Travers' namesake now. He had lied to her, but he had also loved her, in his way, and made sure that she was taken care of. He had stolen her from her mother, but he had thought that he was doing what was best, for her and for everyone else in the world. He had hurt her mother – nobody would explain the details of how – but if he had not, she would never have been born.

The adults had said that she would understand when she was older, but she didn't think that she would ever be old enough to understand her late guardian, or how anybody could love someone and lie to them at the same time.

"Nell?" The door opened a crack and her mother's head appeared. "Didn't hear me knocking, huh?" Faith ruffled her daughter's hair gently, sitting down beside her and glancing down at the book she held. "It must be an interesting read."

"Not really." Nell told her honestly. "I was thinking."

"Anything you want to talk about?"

"Not yet." Nell said quietly, hugging Mr Travers before setting him down next to her. She grinned as she looked up at her mother. "Maybe when you're old enough."

"Brat!" Faith scolded affectionately, surprised when two small arms slipped around her waist, hugging her tightly. Nell had never been a demonstrative child and even after a year, her hugs were rare. "What's this for?"

"Nothing." Nell told her, snuggling closer as her mother's arms closed around her. "I just wanted to hug my mom."

THE END

_Author's Notes: I know it's been a long time in progress, but this story is finally no longer a WIP. I hope that you liked the ending, and the story as a whole. I've got an update in progress for 'Law and Order', so I hope to have that out soon._


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